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I don't recommend razer keyboards anymore since the one time I tried one, I got one that liked to randomly press "F11" while other things were being typed. If you google "Black widow random key presses" you'll see many reports of similar issues -- for me, the one thing that's absolutely inexcusable in a keyboard is for it to not pass your input to the PC properly... especially for keyboards this expensive.

Of course, you can RMA ones that have these kinds of issues, but this is the only keyboard that I've ever heard of having this kind of issue before, and I'd never experience it with dozens of keyboards from any number of other brands until I bought a BlackWidow Ultimate.Reply

Never had that problem on my Razer keyboard.Reason why I stopped buying their keyboards and switched to Logitech is that Razer does not offer "big" ENTER key.For example, Logitech US keyboards also have this small (one row) ENTER key , but their International (or at least UK/EU) keyboards have big (two row) ENTER key.Reply

complaining about the one row enter key in the EU keyboards seems absurd to me, since the "international english" keyboards from Logitech have the much worse issue of a severely shrunken left shift key in order to cram other keys in, one of which is even a duplicate (the \ | key)Reply

I've had a BlackWidow for about 6 months or so now and I've had no issues with mine. My only gripe is not being able to change the backlight colors. I know that the green color is kinda Razer's thing, but it would be nice to be able to change it to something else if I wanted. Luckily my mouse does allow me to change colors so I set it to match my keyboard.Reply

I had the same keyboard as the one in the review. I hurled it against the wall in a fit of anger due to a bug with the Synapse software (it would repeatedly spam the Enter key whenever I logged into Windows after performing a lock). There were reports of a firmware that fixed the issue but it was quietly pulled from Razer's website. It took several weeks and a third update to Synapse to finally resolve the problem. They certainly look and feel very nice but I would compare owning one to be akin to marrying the girl of your dreams, only to discover she has epilepsy.Reply

So the Green = Cherry Blue roughly. What is similar to the orange? Is it closer to red or black?For the record I use Cherry Blue keys on my Leopold for gaming and don't feel they are too heavy or lack anything, but I suppose you can get used to anything.Reply

"If you were to examine the specifications of Razer's new switches, it becomes apparent that their Green and Orange switches are almost identical to the Blue and Brown switches from either Cherry or Kailh respectively"

It's now important that when someone says 'Greens' they specify either Razer Greens or Cherry Greens.Reply

It would be awesome if you could review some of the really inexpensive Monoprice mechanical keyboards and gaming mice. Some of the mice for example look like really expensive Razer or RAT mice for 11 bucks. Reply

I don't even recognize Monoprice anymore, they used to only have cables and cable accessories. It's like Newegg's new marketplace... selling everything trying to compete with Amazon. Monoprice always sold high quality product, though, and I know they offered some of the first budget 120Hz 1440p IPS panels available in the US and even an affordable, decent subwoofer (sounds good if you buy four).Reply

I just got their MEP-933 earphones, very impressive for being 8 bucks, I'd say they're competitive with any IEMs I've heard under 50 bucks. After that, I started looking at their gaming mice too but can't find any good reviews on them. Reply

I don't really have a problem with them trying to sell other stuff to stay competitive as long as the cables part of the business doesn't change, and so far it hasn't. Still the best place to get quality cables for cheap.Reply

I have one of the Monoprice Mechanical Gaming Keyboards with the red blacklight and I have to say, it's been an amazing keyboard so far! I believe it has Cherry MX Red switches, and like the keyboard in this review, all the media/volume/macro keys use a FN modifier key. It also has headphone and mic inputs as well as 2 USB outlets, but it doesn't take an extra USB plug to make them work.All in all, I really like my keyboard and at the time it was about the only red backlit keyboard I could find. Now there's a green one and it seems everyone and their dog does blue. My laptop has a steelseries keyboard in it that can actually do like 6 different colors, why can't mechanical keyboards do more than one color themselves?Reply

"Removing it reveals the green stabilization board that the keys are secured on." HA!! the keys on my Corsair Vengeance K95 are stabilized by a sheet of aluminum, flush mounted so easy to clean, and the keys aren't a garish green. To each their own.Reply

i'll go the opposite direction and state i'm typing this on my cheaper than all of yours mechanical cherry mx blue switched thermaltake poseidon. blue backlighting with level adjust, windows key can be disabled with dedicated button and cherry mx blue switches. very weighty base and was only $89Reply

Pet peeve of mine: what is it with mechanical keyboards using Fn keys for multimedia? It's absurd. This isn't a bloody laptop keyboard, you've got the space.

I had to dig for a very long time to find a mechanical keyboard which also didn't skimp on media keys and volume toggles. Those things are pricy enough already, I don't see why I'd want something gimped in that way.Reply

Does Synapse still require you to register an account online just to adjust the settings for the keyboard? That was the case not too long ago. I'm not touching another Razer product until that goes away entirely.Reply

Yeah, I was wondering about this and was surprised it wasn't mentioned in the review at all. Unfortunately that's a deal breaker for me, I won't be buying a keyboard that needs me to register an account with anything.Reply

you guys can cry about it all you want, but the cloud is the way to go. There's always going to be a few that cry about a feature that benefits the 90th percentile. Your in luck tho, you can still find a few keyboards that include DRAM on board to save your settings, but its archaic.

Razer listened to the minority and added the offline mode feature, something you should be grateful for (a companies willingness to listen to the minority). But to some its still not good enough. At the very least sign up so you can register your product. Razer is heading towards being a mobile devices company (pc's, laptops, tablets, wear-ables etc..), and the cloud is ever important in that area.Reply

The Cloud is fine as an OPTION, not a requirement, especially on a product where cloud integration is largely useless fluff. Who the hell needs their mouse and keyboard settings in the cloud when it's perfectly possible to save them locally? How many people would ever make use of it?Reply

You probably still have to create an account, but as soon as you finish the initial setup, you can switch the software into "Offline" mode, and it will stay that way. The only reason to switch back to "Online" is if you wanted to store your settings in the cloud. Also, it won't do automatic updates unless you're signed in.Reply

Yes, but to me this is a feature that I like. Your profiles are all in the cloud. So if you have multiple desktops, or go to somebody else's house that has razer gear, you just login and BAM, all your settings are there. Its very cool.Reply

I have the original Black Widow Ultimate that came out 3 years ago or so and I really like it. Its been going strong all these years with no issues so far. The only thing I wish was different was that it had dedicated volume/mute keys like my older Saitek keyboards did.Reply

I have that one (Blue backlight Blue MX switches). I had been happily using it since I got it w/zero issues. Then, after my son convinced me to install the wretched synapse nonsense, it decided to update the fw (v1.18 to 2.??). I'm not certain if the mouse (DeathAdder 2013) was also updated. However, now, the BIOS sees that I have _4_ keyboards and _2_ mice plugged in. Further, ever since this has occurred, I can no longer log back in after Windows enters the sleep state. I can _wake_ the machine, and move the mouse, but can't enter any data. Sometimes the backlights are on, sometimes they are off during these events.

This is a new 5960x, x99 build w/Win 8.0. Everything was working flawlessly until I installed that damn software + fw update. I have subsequently _uninstalled_ the crap, but it hasn't helped.

Anyone know of a way to a) acquire an older copies of the kb fw and b) get a flashing tool to install it? When the bits were on my box, I didn't see any obvious tooling to do so. Razer's site is completely worthless. Various Google searches, reference old knowledge base # from Razer, but I can't locate that on their site. Downloads, only allows for acquiring Synapse.

I love Razer mice but would NEVER buy another keyboard. I bought a Tarantula in 2008 thinking it was the greatest thing ever, until I plugged it in.....The audio controls never worked properly (yes I had it plugged in correctly) and it needed a firmware update from the day I bought it. Never once did the firmware update work. I contacted their support team and never once received a reply. I even contacted them at their twitter page, no reply. Sorry Razer, but as a company I'm done with you, unless of course my mouse craps out on me.....I do love that thing. Reply

I cannot speak for their support team from 6 years ago, but I just had to RMA an Intrepador, and they were great. Went back and forth several times to try out different things, when they did not work, I mailed them my old one and had a brand new mouse a week later.Reply

ummm.... what benefit are you referring to. the keyboard will get connected to either a usb port or god forbid a usb-ps/2 adapter and into a ps/2 port. option 1 has lower latency without doing an analog to digital conversion so don't get your point, option 2 is far worse as that's polled even lower than a usb interrupt parse would take for each keystroke to register.

so if you want to live in fantasy land okay analog keyboard actuation would be great with your steampunk'd differnce engine's comptroller portReply

Why would you post such a useless comment?!?! If you don't like Razer, why are you even looking at reviews of their products? It is people like you that convince me that some people shouldn't reproduce.Reply

Sorry, but that is one of the most stupid comments I have ever read, and I have read some stupid ones. People post comments in places like this precisely so others can read the pros and cons of a particular product. Perhaps you are too narrow-minded to figure this out, but just how do you think potential buyers would make purchasing decisions if the only thing they could read was positive reviews. Most people will be able to think about this for maybe ten seconds and realize this is correct. It may take you ten minutes, but you may get there...Reply

I won't buy another Razer product. I had a BW Ultimate and had the random keypresses (not just F11). I RMA'd the first one -- and that took weeks. The replacement started doing the same thing within a month or so. RMA's that one -- again, took weeks. That replacement lasted a little longer but then it started random keypresses. At that point, I just threw away the expensive keyboard and bought another illuminated keyboard which continues to work just fine. This keyboard is half the price and I can change the color of the backlighting. But the best thing about it is that the only time a character gets entered is when I actually press a key. What a nightmare that Razer BW keyboard was.Reply

Won't buy any Razer product ever again after so many experiences with lousy hardware and software. I have a Das Keyboard, and it's great - however, I really miss backlight. What's the next best choice with backlight and similar quality (NOT Razer)?Reply

I have the 2013 Razer black widow and it's a decent keyboard, but I wish they had the Cherry Red keys as well. A friend of mine also has the 2013 Razer black widow and he had to RMA it within two months of getting it.Reply

I had also a razer blackwidow which had random keypress problems (brand new). I searced online and found it was a VERY common issue. Inexcusable in a such a high priced keyboard. Also it was not true NKRO. I have bought a Filco majestic 2 full NKRO (usb to ps/2) and the build quality is far superior and for the around the same price. Reply

A week ago (before I read this) I bought the missus the version without the number pad, and a Death Adder mouse to go with it.

Absolutely wonderful to type on, I mean really. You make much fewer mistakes than with a bundled-with-whatever-pc keyboard most are used to using. It is loud, but as it a lawyer office SHE owns, the rest have to get over it.

However, for gaming, it is worthless. Those long presses, having a having a higher-than-normal pressure to make contact, and then falling quickly down, nah, not for me in gaming.

But I could type with this keyboard all day long...

However, Razar shot themselves in the foot, more than they know.... you have to REGISTER to get full functionality out of their products. Wow, reeeealllly? There is no argument for, that I will accept for this behaviour.

So what I'd like to say here is - I was going to pick her up a Razer Blade Pro from California on my next trip, thought it would make a nice 'talking point' in the office, and the fact that it is not a Mac in that form factor.

But Razer - with your mandatory registration - you can FORGET IT.

Dell however, seem to have some new offerings that are of interest. Razer, are you listening? Reply

Got the keyboard yesterday, Awesome Built quality, Mechanical Keys with Backlit Illumination Looks CoolAli i can say that good qualityAnyways got a good deal from an indian website offered me Cash On Delivery and they charged me Rs 1000/- lesser than all big players Hats OFF!!!!check yourself herehttp://www.martnext.com/razer-blackwidow-ultimate-...Reply

I got the "Razer Black Widow Ultimate Stealth Edition" just over a year ago. Such a long product name. Mine's from the first line of these keyboards - since then they've lengthened the name even more by adding a year to it.

Mine's been a solid keyboard so far. Feels solid and after a year's use, all of the blue LEDs are still fine. The thick braided cable is herniating a bit just after it comes out of the back of the keyboard. I'm planning on reinforcing that somehow, but don't have a plan yet.

I do have a few gripes about it though. It doesn't have the layout I'm used to (turns out that's the US ANSI one [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keyboard_layout#Mech...]) and I miss that SO much. To the right of the spacebar there's no Windows key and the Function keys across the top are shifted right a bit.

I also miss having dedicated media keys. To adjust volume you have to hold the FN key in the bottom right and hit the Function keys in the top left. Sounds silly, but that takes 2 hands and if you're trying to mute the PC while answering a phone, it's a pain.

Razer also has some ideas with their software that bother me. This is before they started "big brothering" their Synapse software and requiring you to create an online account, but it seems they were already thinking along those lines.

The keyboard has onboard memory for storing macros and it has a physical key for starting "learning mode" (FN + Right Alt I think). Because all of that is in the keyboard itself, I thought I'd be fine using the keyboard without the Synapse software. Not so. When the keyboard "boots" it waits for the Synapse software to send the "all clear" signal before the keyboard will respond to the record macro button! If you have an OS that doesn't run Synapse or you don't want to install their software, you can't record macros.

Note this brilliant fellow's done something involving USB snooping software and a low level USB driver to make it work on Linux [http://www.finch.am/projects/blackwidow/]. If you're hoping to record macros while hooked up to an XBox 360 or something even more obscure, it's going to be harder than you think. Does Synapse run on MacOS?Reply

Khail? greens might not be worse than Cherry Mx Blues, but the QC certainly is. My Ultimate chroma has gone back twice. Once with an E key that lost its clicky sound within a week and the second replacement had a lousy delete key.Ok, so it serves me right buying a gimmicky in, I suppose. However, I have a very poor memory, so color coding is perfect for remembering different keys' meanings. Reply

BEFORE YOU BUY, I would like to share my story dealing with Razer "customer support" and you will decide for yourself.1. Recently bought the keyboard -- Razer BlackWidow 2014 Mechanical Keyboard in particular.2. Keyboard happened to be missing one leg that raises it up and one rubber foot.3. Naturally, I contacted Razer "customer support" to see if they could send me the missing parts (the missing leg and missing rubber foot), as without them I could neither raise the keyboard, nor I it was steady enough (it was actually rocking) when typing.4. Razer "customer support" says they don't send or sell parts but can replace the whole keyboard.5. In order to replace the whole keyboard, they needed all the whole gamut of information -- the serial number, model, etc. I provided.6. A day later, they come back to me saying this -- "We will make an EXCEPTION for you and will replace it for you but you have to CUT THE CORD and send us a picture of it." I was like "WTF?!!! An exception? The keyboard is on warranty, I don't need any EXCEPTIONS. And cutting the corn on my $120 keyboard will render is useless. How soon will I receive the replacement keyboard?!!"7. So I send them the picture of the keyboard with the cord cut and you know what Razer say???!!! "The photo looks photoshopped, so you're not getting any replacement!"8. So I am left with no functioning keyboard, no replacement, and I can't even sell it now because the cord is cut!!!

Now you decide if you want to deal with the company that treats you like crap!Reply